Welcome to our community

Be a part of something great, join today!

Log in
  • Hey all, just changed over the backend after 15 years I figured time to give it a bit of an update, its probably gonna be a bit weird for most of you and i am sure there is a few bugs to work out but it should kinda work the same as before... hopefully :)

RED charger problem

Tanner Stauss

Tanner Stauss

Well-known member
Joined
Jul 1, 2008
Messages
344
Reaction score
0
Points
0
Age
41
Location
California
Something is wrong with one of our RED chargers. We have two power-packs(two chargers, four batteries). I leave two batteries on the "bad" charger over night, only to find they both still have only one LED charge indicator lighting up the next morning, no good. Why is this happening, or is it just busted and should be replaced?
 
tannerstauss said:
Something is wrong with one of our RED chargers. We have two power-packs(two chargers, four batteries). I leave two batteries on the "bad" charger over night, only to find they both still have only one LED charge indicator lighting up the next morning, no good. Why is this happening, or is it just busted and should be replaced?
Click to expand...

Take the batteries off, put powerpack of,disconnect the power kabel. This to reset your system.
Connect power kabel and put powerpack on and then put the batteries on.

To prefent this next time don't let the batterie go under the 10% i have been told.

Good luck
Robert
 
Biba said:
Now in all barberries are function that did not allow you to kill battery . So always will stay voltage to charge batteries .
Click to expand...

you are right, but the powerpack seems to work better if you not let it go untill the camera says "powering down"

try it
 
Yes!! I have experienced the same thing. Our battery sat on the charger overnight, but it wouldn't charge past one red bar. We then sent the battery into Red thinking it was defective, but Red said the battery was fine. I then noticed the same process happen again with a different battery which made me believe that it was a defective charger. After I removed the battery and re-seated it, it charged to full bars.
 
I have had numerous cases of batteries not charging, usually because I asked people to put batteries on charge for me, and they didn't check the light was Orange. I must say sometimes it's difficult to see if the light is Red (not charging) or Orange (charging).

I have found out one thing though, if you let your batteries cool down for a while (10 minutes or so), after taking them off the camera, and before putting them on your charger, you don't get the Red light and they start charging without a hitch.

Cheers,
Damien
 
Charger

Charger

earthling said:
I have found out one thing though, if you let your batteries cool down for a while (10 minutes or so), after taking them of the camera, and before putting them on your charger, you don't get the Red light and they start charging without a hitch.
Click to expand...

That is a good tip. When batteries are hot, they cannot be safely charged, so the charger checks (once) and prevents charge up. Removing the battery and reseating it allows the charger to make that test again.

Waiting a little while will allow the battery to cool enough that the charger will allow the battery to pass the over temperature test.

Ultimately, we'd like to improve the charger firmware so the battery can cool on-charger and the test can be made at say 10 minute periods ...
 
That was quick Stuart. You guys are always present, amazing. You replied before I had time to notice I wrote off with one f.

That would be great, to improve the charger, to redo the test after a while, because it is quite a bummer to come back hours later or the next day and realize your batteries haven't charged.

There is no way existing chargers could be updated is there ?

Cheers,
Damien
 
Aha! I was wondering. I was getting intermittent "failures" with the charger going red. I hadn't had enough time to do a comprehensive test to ascertain a pattern. the hot battery issue makes perfect sense.

On another note, is there a .pdf version of the charger manual? I would like to re-print it for my camera package (keeping the originals safe at home.)

Best,

Michael
 
ldill said:
Yes!! I have experienced the same thing. Our battery sat on the charger overnight, but it wouldn't charge past one red bar. We then sent the battery into Red thinking it was defective, but Red said the battery was fine. I then noticed the same process happen again with a different battery which made me believe that it was a defective charger. After I removed the battery and re-seated it, it charged to full bars.
Click to expand...

Same thing is happening to me. It is happening to both our chargers now, not just the one I originaly posted about.
 
I had a problem with the charger as it stopped charging and its fan stopped working. Red replaced it in a few days.
So what are the conclusions?
Not to drain batteries before charging?
To wait 10 minutes for the battery to cool down before charging?
What else?
 
I live in a hot climate and see the red light coming up a lot of times. I let them cool down by themselves or put a fan on them and then they charge fine. Annoying is that you have to wait until the light stops blinking before you know if the battery is going to charge.

I am a bit confused about wether it is bad for the batteries to fully drain them. If they are cool they charge just fine. And from my MacBook I know it is good to fully drain the LI battery every know and then to remove any memory effect. Anybody from RED who knows?
 
Lithium Ion batteries do not have a memory like Nickle Cadmium. You do not need to drain them fully to avoid voltage drop-offs as NiCd batteries require.

For everything you could possibly want to know about battery care and feeding:
http://www.batteryuniversity.com

Michael
 
You can also read the VIDEO BATTERY HANDBOOK, which can be found at www.antonbauer.com. Go to "How to Choose", then "Technical Information" and then "Video Battery Handbook".
 
Stuart English said:
Ultimately, we'd like to improve the charger firmware so the battery can cool on-charger and the test can be made at say 10 minute periods ...
Click to expand...

This would be really handy... on our last show we had 14 batteries swinging on 7 chargers on the camera truck, and consistently 2 or 3 of them would go red, requiring a reset.

Letting the batteries cool works, but that gets tough to manage when the trainee is running back & forth to set... easy to get behind on the charges.
 
This is another advantage to using Anton/Bauer batteries and chargers. There is a two-way communication between the battery and charger and they are constantly "talking". If a battery is too hot (or too cold), the charger will put the battery into a "Hold" mode, for safety reasons. Once the battery cools down (or warms up) to a proper charging temperature, the charger will automatically start charging it. There is no need to sit there and put the battery on and off of the charger.
Paul
 
Dynacore Products

Dynacore Products

Dear Michael,
Hi, I checked your website, very interested. We have the same products like you deal with, Fresnel lights, soft light, HMI, ect, please check at www.dynacore-china.com, if you find any items interested, feel free to contact me. ;-)


Michael Morlan said:
Aha! I was wondering. I was getting intermittent "failures" with the charger going red. I hadn't had enough time to do a comprehensive test to ascertain a pattern. the hot battery issue makes perfect sense.

On another note, is there a .pdf version of the charger manual? I would like to re-print it for my camera package (keeping the originals safe at home.)

Best,

Michael
Click to expand...
 
RED-BRICK batteries

RED-BRICK batteries

This is another advantage to using Anton/Bauer batteries and chargers. There is a two-way communication between the battery and charger and they are constantly "talking".
Click to expand...

Maybe I wasn't clear, the RED CHARGER and RED-BRICK battery do have a two-way serial communication, but at this time the charger only makes one "safety check" when the battery is first mounted, rather than repeating the test a bit later if it initially fails that check.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top